The Feast of the Gods

Bellini painted The Feast of the Gods in 1514, when he was in his eighties, for the private study of Alfonso d'Este, Duke of Ferrara. It was one of the last paintings he completed before his death in 1516, and it is one of the great masterpieces of Venetian Renaissance art. The painting shows a banquet of the gods in a wooded landscape. Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune, and the other Olympians sit or recline around a table, eating and drinking. Mercury pours wine from a pitcher. Apollo sits at the left with his lyre. A nymph at the right holds a bowl of fruit. In the background, a landscape of hills and trees stretches to the horizon. The figures are arranged in a frieze across the canvas, each one engaged in a specific action. The painting was commissioned by Alfonso d'Este as part of a series of mythological scenes for his camerino, or private study, in the Castello Estense in Ferrara. Bellini painted the first canvas, and after his death, Titian completed two more. Titian also reworked parts of Bellini's painting, changing the landscape behind the figures to make it consistent with his own canvases. The painting therefore contains the work of two of the greatest Venetian painters, though Bellini's contribution is the larger. Bellini was born in Venice around 1430, the son of the painter Jacopo Bellini and the brother of Gentile Bellini. He was the most influential painter in Venice for fifty years, and his students included Titian and Giorgione. His late paintings, like The Feast of the Gods, show a warmth and a richness of color that distinguish them from his earlier, more austere work. He was one of the first painters in Italy to use oil paint, which he learned from Northern European painters, and which allowed him to build color in thin, luminous layers. Oil on canvas, 170 by 188 centimeters, roughly 67 by 74 inches. Bellini used oil glazes to build the flesh tones, giving the gods' skin a warm, living quality. The draperies are deep blues, reds, and greens, each one built in layers of color. The landscape behind the figures was repainted by Titian, who used a darker, more atmospheric style. This print works in a dining room, where the subject of a feast suits the setting. The rich colors and the mythological subject pair with dark wood furniture, candlelight, and traditional interiors. The 18x24 size gives the figures and the landscape enough detail to read. The painting is in the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., part of the Andrew W. Mellon Collection.